Monthly Archives: December 2014

Born of God: “The vast multitudes of humankind are evidently unaware of being Children of the Most High.”Thomas Paterson Brown, PhD 1938-2012

Originally entitled “Theogenesis,” this essay is written by Thomas Paterson Brown, professor of philosophy, who left us in 2012. Paterson spent the better part of a life working with the Coptic gospels discovered in 1945 at Nag Hammadi. His works include brilliantly annotated and hyperlinked translations of the gospels of Thomas, Phillip and Truth (English/Spanish). These may be browsed and downloaded from FreelyReceive. ‌

The canonical Gospels teach that the disciple per se is born of God rather than of human parents: ‘To all who received him … he gave power to be generated children of God; who were born, not of … the will of a human, but born of God’ (Jn 1:12-13); ‘You are all Brothers and Sisters. Do not call anyone on earth father, for you have one Father, and he is in heaven.’ (Mt 23:8-9). Hence the Savior’s astonishing assertion in the Thomas Gospel: ‘My mother (the Virgin) bore me, but my true Mother (the Sacred Spirit) gave me the life.’ (Th 101, interlinear).

I held up the stubborn pen and squinted at it: “I know that you’re God’s pen because everything belongs to him,” I said. Late this December evening, neither myself nor my faithful pen seemed to know what to write. My memory of the day held missing time. So I stared into the virgin white page, decided to jot down whatever came to mind, and trust the rest to God’s pen. As I began to write, I had no idea that this would be the most important night of my life.